S omehow she managed to look good in this, I thought, looking at the zigzag stitches of my mother’s long, wine-colored down coat—one that Nana had inexplicably decided to keep. I’d grabbed it out of the closet because it seemed like it would keep me warm over my nightshirt and sweats, and pulled on a pair of my father’s old duck boots. It was one of those outfits where normally you’d think, I hope I don’t get into an accident looking like this. But I didn’t, because there wasn’t much room for me to think about anything else but where we were going, and besides, the whole topic of accidents was complicated at that particular moment.
The brakes on the Jaguar screeched a bit as David turned onto Route 12, and he grimaced. “I’m going to have to get those looked at,” he said. It was the first time he’d spoken since we rushed down the frigid driveway and into the car. “It’s a good thing I kept this baby in nice shape. I had no idea my dad would ever see it again.”
I smiled at him and turned to look out the window, trying hard to stop myself from shivering, even with the heat turned way up. I was finally doing this, and I was petrified.
Route 12 had always been one of my favorite roads. It was lined with woods on either side, and often, we’d spy deer wandering just yards from the pavement. This is what my family saw, I reminded myself, even though it was all stark and spindly now; back in the spring this landscape was thick, lush. Maybe Toby was looking out the window at these exact trees in the last few minutes he was alive. What were my parents talking about and thinking about as they passed that spot, and that spot, and that one?
We drove for another minute or so. Just enough time for a car to pick up too much momentum, for someone to get lost in conversation or his own thoughts and not watch the speedometer.
“I think it’s right up around this bend,” said David, and he began to slow down. I could see, now, that this was where a person could forget about the sharpness of the curve, and the traffic light not too far beyond it, and slam on the brakes. I looked at the northbound lane, and thought of how another person might lose control and let their car go over the double yellow line and make someone swerve off the road to avoid them.
“What if we can’t find it?” I asked.
“We’ll get close enough,” he said confidently, determined. When we saw the traffic light up in the distance, I scanned the road but wasn’t sure what I was looking for. I guess I just expected to know.
David pulled the car into the breakdown lane and we sat there, listening to the gusty breath of the dashboard heater. It was almost midnight, and there weren’t many cars on the road.
I peered out the window but it all looked unremarkable, until David said, “There. Look.”
I followed his gaze to a speed limit sign about twenty yards ahead of us. It had a thick purple ribbon wrapped around it, which even in the dark looked faded and old. Then I remembered Nana telling me that there’d been a little makeshift memorial at the accident scene for several weeks after, with people bringing candles and flowers. Toby’s classmates left notes, which the police eventually collected and gave to Nana. Who then put them in his dresser, unread.
“You think that’s it?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said. He got out of the car, so I did too. And the first thing I saw was how the side of the road sloped down steeply here, several hundred feet, before leveling out into woods.
The ditch where my family had actually died. I had to catch my breath when I saw it, and realized it wasn’t at all what I’d pictured. I wasn’t sure what I’d been afraid of for so long, and just being there made me feel stronger.
David walked to the edge of the slope and looked down, his face blank. He pulled an object out of his front jeans pocket, kissed it, and threw it as far as he could. I couldn’t see what it was.
Was there something I was supposed to do or say, standing here above this place? All I could think was, Now I’ve seen it, and I owed them that. It was like a favor I’d just returned.
And then, unexpectedly, I started to feel glad I was there.
I hadn’t visited my family’s graves since the funeral. There wouldn’t be anything there until April, the one-year anniversary, because Nana was sticking to Jewish tradition in the headstone department. And it didn’t feel like I needed to go anywhere to be with them. They were still in every inch of space at our house, around our house, and every other place I went.
But this was where they had gone away. It was where it had all changed. A place where I could say everything, or nothing at all.
It suddenly seemed enough for me to say, silently in my head, I just love you all so much.
David came over to where I stood, and kicked at a pebble. “That’s done.”
“I’m freezing,” I said.
Everything else was too big for words.
We got back into the car, which thankfully he’d kept running, so the warmth was a sweet relief. David put his hands on the wheel but did nothing else. We sat there, looking out at the charcoal gray sky through the windshield.
“When we told my dad that Mom’s gone . . . ,” he said. “Seeing him deal with that, so new and everything . . . it was like the past eight months never happened for me. It was like losing her all over again.”
I reached out, unafraid, and touched his hair. He didn’t look at me, but he didn’t stop me as I started to stroke it. “Your mom was cool,” I said.
David nodded. “You wouldn’t know it from looking at her, but she was. I only see that now, of course. She got me. She put up with a lot of stuff that most moms wouldn’t, to make up for what Dad was doing.”
I pulled my hand away involuntarily. “What was he doing?”
I must have sounded really nervous because David laughed. “Nothing like that, nothing you’d see in a TV movie or something. He just didn’t like me, and he wasn’t afraid to show it. Although he did hit me once and I got a big bruise, right here.” He touched the corner of one eye, and I remembered David showing up at school with a shiner, telling people he’d gotten into a fight at a party.
“I deserved it,” he continued. “We were both drunk and I totally provoked him. Nice, huh? Real sweet suburban family. I guess he got an involuntary rehab with this whole thing.”
We were quiet for a moment and then I asked him, “So you think you’ll stay?”
It wasn’t about Mr. Kaufman. It was about me. I was ready to admit that I wanted David near me. It was one thing I now knew I wanted for myself; maybe I should tell him that.
He turned and smiled at me, and took the hand that had just been petting his hair. “I don’t know, Laurel. It felt really good to go.” Then his smile disappeared, and he looked very serious. “I think you should try it.”
I didn’t get it at first, but then I did. “You mean Yale.”
“Yale, or anywhere else that’s not here. Which equals your life. Versus not Yale or anywhere else that’s not here, which equals sitting here in this car at this place, in, you know, a metaphorical sense, indefinitely.”
I did get that one. I could see that.
I watched a pickup truck speed by us. Then a few seconds later, a minivan. It was amazing how fast it seemed they were going, with us standing so still.
“Can you make this car move again, like, quickly?” I asked.
David’s smile came back. “I sure can.”
He put the car in gear and pulled slowly back onto the road, where up ahead of us the light had just turned green. It seemed strange yet perfect to me that within a second—less than a second—we were farther down the route to Freezy’s than our families had gotten that night back in April.
We were continuing on.